I went to a meeting at the Marshall Saline Development Corporation office on Tuesday, Sept. 11, and heard this story:

"My name is Orson Olson. I'm 36 years old and I have three kids -- two boys and a girl. I'm still married, but my wife ran off about a year ago and left the kids with me. I don't know where she is and to tell you the truth, I don't much care. It's better for my kids if she's gone -- she had a bad drug habit and a lot of low-life people she hung out with. She used to work, but when she did, she didn't work long at any one place.

"I work at the hospital. I'm a Certified Nurse Assistant. The pay isn't great -- I get about $8 an hour -- and between that and $190 a month in food stamps, we're getting by okay so far. Just feeding the four of us costs around $450 a month.

"I don't have any health insurance. The hospital offers it, but for me and the three kids, it's more than $250 a month, and there's no money for that.

"My girl goes to day care and that costs $80 a week, but at least I know she's being taken care of. My two boys go to my sister's after school until I get off work around 6 every evening.

"I had a car that was paid for, but it got stolen last week. I always lock it, but around this neighborhood, a locked car doesn't mean much. Anybody that wants it just breaks in a window and takes it. And nobody tells if they saw it happen. I couldn't afford to have insurance on it.

"We have a house -- at least for now, anyway. That costs me $600 a month, but the utility bills are pretty high -- more than $200 a month. Even with food stamps, it's hard to keep the kids fed. Sometimes when it's close to payday, we just eat cereal for dinner. I put myself on a diet, won't hurt me to lose a few pounds, and at least that leaves a little more food for the boys and my little girl.

"Without a car, I'm going to have to find another way to get to work. It's too far to walk, and there are no buses that go by there at the right time. I've got to have that job. It's the only thing standing between the four of us and the street. I do odd jobs here and there when I can, and try to get paid in cash, because it's real hard to get a check cashed.

"There's a bank across the street from the hospital, but I can't get my checks cashed there because I don't have an account. I used to have one, but when my wife left, she cleaned it out and now my credit's so bad they won't give me another one. That means I have to take my check to the money store to get it cashed. They charge me 10 percent just to cash the check … another $30 a week I can't afford, but there's nowhere else to go.

"I don't know how we got into this mess. My wife and I got married about 15 years ago and we both had jobs, and things were pretty good. We both worked hard for ourselves and our kids, but then she got into drugs and everything started to go downhill. And once it got started, it seemed like there was nothing I could do to stop it. There's lots of night I can't sleep, for worrying about what's going to happen to us. All we need is just a couple of good breaks and we can make it back up that hill again. I don't need to be rich. I just need a decent place to live and to be able to give my kids a decent life and not be afraid every minute that one of us will get sick or that we won't have a place to live or food to eat."

After I heard that story, I had an opportunity to live it, as Mr. Olson lives it. The Missouri Valley Community Action Agency staff was on hand to help a small group of people participate in a "poverty simulation" designed show us what it is like to live four weeks in the life of a real person. As Cheryl Zimney, the Community Development Manager of MVCAA pointed out, "You're only going to do this for an hour. Mr. Olson and his family can't walk away like you will."

And let me tell you, it's a hard life.

Before the end of the first week, a mere 15 minutes, I was angry in a way I haven't been in a very long time. The simple act of getting my paycheck cashed consumed a lot more time than it would have if I'd had a bank account and direct deposit, something I take for granted. My $320 weekly paycheck melted away quickly when taxes were deducted and after I had to pay 10 percent of what was left just to get it cashed.

In the second week, I couldn't even get to the hospital to pick up my check because my car was stolen.

In the third week, I went to jail because the guy at the money store accused me of stealing from him. Frustrated and confused about what to do next, I paid $50 to bail myself out of jail, and when I got home, found a notice from the bank that my house payment was late again. The police came to the door and said they'd found my car, which was good news until they told me they'd found it in a parking lot across town, stripped and burned.

In the fourth week, I just sat in my house and wondered what to do next, so I didn't go to work and I didn't get paid and then someone threatened to take away my children because I couldn't feed them.

At the end of the simulation, the participants get a chance to ask questions. My first question was, "Does this really happen? Surely all of these things don't happen at once to one person, do they?"

Yes, they do.

Let me repeat that.

Yes, they do.

There is ample evidence that here in the Midwest, the chances of a child growing up in poverty are increasing. In a 2006 study titled, "The New Poor: Regional trends in Child Poverty since 2000," released by the National Center for Children in Poverty at Columbia University, New York, authors Ayana Douglas-Hall and Heather Koball report that "the greatest increase in child poverty is among working people in the Midwest. It is the only region of the U.S. where poverty increased among the children of employed parents, due in part to the loss of relatively well-paid manufacturing jobs."

Most parents of children in poverty do have jobs, sometimes more than one. But they're more likely to be service-sector jobs that don't pay as well as those long-gone jobs in manufacturing and rarely have benefits like insurance, paid holidays or medical leave.

About half of the children in Saline County schools receive free or reduced-price lunches. There are about 5,350 children in the county, and of that number a bit more than 21 percent are living in poverty. That's one in every 5 children.

The average wage county-wide is $12.60 per hour. The self-sufficiency wage for a family of four in 2003 was $14.82 per hour. That's a shortfall of more than $4,000 a year.

One more statistic tells a lot of the story. Of every 100 students in Saline County who enter high school, only 85 graduate. Of those who graduate, a little less than half go on to 2- or 4-year colleges, or pursue vocational-technical education. That leaves 15 out of 100 who don't graduate at all and another 38 or so who don't pursue any additional education and that is a very serious problem in our high-tech world. A lack of education beyond high school is a serious handicap in the 21st century.

If you have an opportunity to participant in a poverty simulation, I urge you to do so. It's no game. You will never look at your life in the same way again. There is much work to be done to end poverty in this country and we must all be a part of that work in whatever way we can.

Oh, by the way, Monday would be a good day to get started. MVCAA is holding the Second Annual Ending Poverty Walk -- One Step at a time, beginning with a kickoff rally at 8 a.m. on the steps of the Saline County Courthouse.

Editor's note: Read more about the Walk and the Rally on page one.